Laphroaig 18 was my clear favorite regular production dram. When it was announced they were discontinuing it, I went out and bought 7 bottles. I luckily have 1.5 left after giving one to my BIL for their wedding a few years ago. Really, truly a shame they stopped making it.
I would have enjoyed this a lot more if you didn't look at the reveal until the very end. The process of elimination aspect made the blind component less robust and interesting.
@@SippersSocialClub I completely understand the reaction part... gets a little boring slugging through the entire series. if you were to do something like this again maybe have separate envelopes for each glass so you only know what you've advance not what you've eliminated. great video though cheers!
@@SippersSocialClub What about another two rounds? peated round and unpeated one,love your content btw easy accent for non native english speakers,cheers buddy!
That is such a beautiful lineup. I got lucky when I stumbled upon my dusty bottle of 18 year old laphroiag for only $100 US. Been thinking about grabbing that Talisker 18 for a while now too. Some wonderful scotches, cheers 🥃
I absolutely love that Springbank is considered so lowly on scotch addicts. Can you imagine a world where Springbank was globally sought after. Doesn’t bare thinking about 🤪
@@SippersSocialClub just literally bought two Springbank 17 Madeira Woods today. Can’t wait to open one of them! Sold out in 6 minutes online here in the U.K.
What? How dare you, how dare you Mendip? (just kidding). We love Springbank in SA. With so many posts and comments and so many more available whisky's out there I can see why you may say that. Do a poll like our most excellent host has done. If you've been in SA for a while I'm sure you've seen my Springbank bottles and know it's one of my favorite distilleries. I'm the game warden at Scotch Addict :) I don't catch many whisky video's of late but this was an excellent comparison and very entertaining. I appreciate the Scotch Addict mention
This was a fun video to watch. Talisker is my personal favorite distillery, but you have a lot of solid bottles there for sure! No clue what I'd end up picking as my favorite.
I've got about 200+ bottles in my collection and I've been thinking about doing some videos like this. Not because I like sharing content but because I've got probably 15-20 different 18 year scotches that I could put in a blind.
Bunnahabhain 18 for me, probably followed by The Glendronach, would never waste my money on Macallan, bang average whisky and bloody expensive, shame you didn't review the Ancnoc 18, very underrated whisky. Great blind tasting review.
@@Tommy_ZM I can afford it, but it is not worth the money, so would never buy it, in my opinion if you have the Glendronach 18 pre 2020, it is miles better, Macallan just lacks the depth that others offer, for a lot less money, it is a no brainer to me, the Arran 18 is another I would rather buy 👍🥃
A mighty impressive lineup. Perhaps a missed opportunity to round them up in like segments and pick a best of in each: Sherry Bombs (Arran, Macallan, Glendronach) Peated (Laphroig, Talisker, Longrow) Coastal (Bunna, Spring & HP)
Great video👍🏻😄 You moved forward all my favorites from round one👍🏻😋 Laphroaig is also my number one pick closely followed by Talisker🤗 But missing the Bowmore 18y☺️
@@SippersSocialClub My thought, exactly. The Bowmore 18 is one of my favorites. JW needs to come out with some higher ABV versions, as they did with the cask strength Blue a number of years ago. The Green is quite nice, though.
Great vid, I think the bottles should remain unknown until you a pick a winner, it's easier to guess when they are in front of you and thus becoming a bit biased :D.. Cheers
What a tasting! Talisker 18 is one of my all-time favorites. I'd love to try Laphroaig 18 someday. I thought Old Pulteney 18 was disappointingly light and simple the first time I tried it, but after the bottle had been open for a week, it got much fuller and more interesting. Now, I love it.
This was a fun watch J. Almost every time I order whisky from UK, I add a Talisker 18 to the order. Easily the best value 18 out there at around $80 in UK. Good job!
Pretty epic line up and tasting! Great job! 100% Tali 18 is my fav out of this line up. I am sure I would love the Laphroaig 18 but I have never had it.
Great bottles! very fun to watch! These are my favorites. (Yoichi 10YO, Glenlivet Illicit Still 12YO, Glendronach 15YO, Laphroaig 18YO and no doubt Springbank 21 YO).
Great lineup and a fun day of tasting, I’m sure! Can’t help but think it might have been better to do separate tastings for peated and unpeated expressions. Also the whole idea of equating whiskies just on age is dubious but I get that it’s a good theme for a program. When I host a blind tasting I choose whiskies that have very similar profiles regardless of age, and I try to include something very cheap and at least one obscure independent bottling, to keep the panel guessing 😁
I agree on the seperating peat or at least leaving peated stuff until the end of tastings . But I prefer to mix up casks etc in tastings to diversify the taste spectrum, but in terms of themed tastings your way is great with the cheapy hidden... more times then not the cheapy does better then expected
laphroaig lore is one of the only whiskys that made me close my eyes and savor the moment. A shame the 18 got discontinued I always wonder if the 18 is that much better
I love the Talisker 18, I brought a bottle in from Scotland to my delight, as it isn't available in Canada. The only other 18 YO that I have is Timorous Beastie 18, it's very good.
Awesome video! Lately I did do a blind tasting (took several weeks!) and it was almost impossible to choose between Bunnahabhain 18 vs Cairdeas Triple Wood. Picking between Peated vs unpeated. Or moderate ABV vs High ABV. At the end I just had to pick the one I enjoyed more at that moment.
I pretty much had it figured out which would make the final and I was right, it's just so frustrating that the best are unattainable (Laphroaig,Talisker,Macallan) and now even the Springbank is very difficult to get. Interesting to note that only 4 of the 12 are available here in Canada's largest province! and only one of those (Springbank) made it to your final and it's only available in very limited amounts temporarily at an outrageous price. Frustrating eh! Great idea and well done for this shootout, would like to see more of this kind of thing.
LCBO is incredibly frustrating. Why don't they have Talisker 18? They have/had the 10 and the 25, makes no sense. And if you're taking value then these results would definitely change.
Thanks for the video. I remember years ago getting into whisky and buying laphroaig 18 for $80 - i need a time machine To go back and buy cases at that price.
Awesome lineup today. Pretty damn jealous, actually. Kinda comparing apples and oranges when you put peated drams in the mix, but the length of the finish on peated scotch is undeniable. Maybe tomorrow, you'll be turned off by the peat. Cheers Jeremy 🥃🇨🇦 #letsgopalate
I think good peated whisky has an advantage in a situation like this, especially when palate fatigue sets in, bolder whisky shines through. Cheers buddy!
Is that the Billy Walker Glendronach 18? That one and the old 15 yr olds are to this day my benchmark sherried scotches. Ironically the only bottles I have tried and still have in my stash from your final 5 is the Bunna and the Laphroaig. Luckily have 3 bottles of that Laphroaig (green tube). On the other hand I have never tasted the Talisker , Springbank or the Macallan 18s. At their current prices I don’t think I ever will. I picked up the Laphroaigs when they were on the shelves for $95. During that time Glendronach 21, Glenfarclas 25, Talisker 18, Old Pulteney 21 for example were all @$140 or less. Hopefully some 18 year old bottles will remain somewhat affordable going into the future for the drinkers to enjoy.
Awesome tasting. Most whisky channels would’ve spread it across four videos. How would you say the current Macallan 18 would stand up against the Glendronach 18 or Bunnahabhain 18 ?
I know most channels would drag this out, but I wanted to cut it down as much as possible and keep it concise. I honestly haven't tried the newest Macallan 18 sherry. Reviews are dipping and prices are just too high for me to buy a bottle. I think it's safe to say the Glendronach and Bunna are much better value buys, cheers
Perhaps a fairer test would be peat vs peat for those of us that don't consider burnt seaweed dirt as palatable as something that might be of a sherried or even port casks nature
Laphroaig 18 was $100 in my area when they still made it, and by far, the best 18 year old for value. It actually completes with $200 whisky, and still edges out in my opinion.
Really good episode and well done for putting it together. I think it raises a number of interesting points and the first one is our fascination with the number 18 as an age statement. It harks back to a time when an 18 year old whisky was the height of luxury and something for a special occasion such as a retirement gift or an important anniversary. For most people such a thing would have been once in a lifetime. Interestingly, the brands that most would have bought, and the ones that will outsell all of your selection this Christmas, would be Glenfiddich, Glenlivet and Glenmorangie and not many places would have sold such a thing. It's amazing today that we should so casually have the shelves in our homes groaning with the weight of 18 year old whisky and even older from every region of Scotland and beyond. Again, we are so used to all ages these days, particularly from the independents, which really shows how the industry has changed. I guess the old way was to have an age that was demonstrably 'mature' and big enough to be worth the price difference to a respectable 12 year age statement. Besides, distilleries couldn't have a business model with all kinds of ages and recipes. (All the fancy stuff we see on Serge's site would have been available to a tiny minority of wealthy and connected types or obsessional geeks with money.) Even today you can live in parts of the U.K where you wont be able to buy a malt whisky in a shop within a 30 minute drive except possibly Glenfiddich 12. The internet has transformed whisky purchasing in the U.K and other parts of the world far more than it has in the States and Canada with those massive shops which don't exist in Europe. It was interesting to see what your (and our) preconceptions were. It's clear that when we do side to side comparisons the distilleries with bold flavour and strength always win. There's no room for understatement and subtlety which is unfortunate because when the mood is right those whiskys are just the thing we want. Some of the comparison was apples and oranges. How do we really compare peated whisky and sherried whisky? I know people in both camps that won't touch either. I'm glad the Macallan 18 shone through though and got the better of the Glendronach. I can't stand the Macallan monster these days but the 18, until a few years ago, was a beautiful and superbly made whisky. The 1995 was great and I still have a 1994 in the stash. Quality cask selection and a great marriage. It can't be compared to Talisker or Longrow etc.brcause it's completely different. Here's a question; why should Springbank 18 be considered the best? Seriously, people have become obsessed with that distillery in the past couple of years. I love my Springbank/Longrow/Hazelburn but let's have a little perspective and common sense. People are chasing it like they chase Stagg. Finally, is 18 better than 15, 12, 10, etc? It's not in my opinion. As I said in the beginning, it once had status but we all know so much more about whisky now. I prefer young Laphroaig to older Laphroaig. Two Talisker 10's or one Talisker 18? I can buy Bunnahabhain 12 for £30 a bottle which is three or four of them for the 18. Older can, of course, be better (especially ex-bourbon for me) but it's not the badge of honour it once was. Excellent post and sorry for the long reply but I hope you enjoy it. WT
In a tasting like this, heavier bolder whiskies definitely have an advantage, especially when palate fatigue sets in at the end. The video is titled best 18 scotch, not best sherried, or best peated, although doing those separate could produce more consistent results. As I said, I could have picked any one of those top 5 or 6 on any given day and declared it my favorite. I would like to do this again with other age stated scotches. I think the 8 year old category would be interesting. At the end of the day this video was just intended to be fun and entertaining, not a definitive statement on all 18 year old scotch. I didn't mention value or availability, that's a conversation for another video, but obviously my choices would be different if we were talking price. Cheers Welsh!
Just wondering how much of an open exposed-to-air bottle affects the palette in deciding which is best as opposed to a new bottle that hasn't been exposed to air ?
Was thinking the whole time if Talisker 18 won't make it to top 3 I'll be a child and click dislike (one of my all time faves) and there you go, it delivered big time! I'm lucky enough to have a Laphroaig 18 open as well now and I gotta say I prefer the Talisker even to that one, close though.
haha! Im glad you weren't the first thumbs down. Talisker 18 is a fine pour indeed! I was surprised it did that well, especially beating out the Springbank
This does look like a fun day! Some tough brackets with all heavy hitters. Curious how the Springbank and Longrow do side by side ? Just opened my 2019 Longrow 18 and to me it has a Springbank level peat and is very good. Cheers Jeremy
Very enjoyable. I like Laphroaig 18. I was surprised the Talisker appeared to give it a run for its money. I think doing the tasting without revealing the scotches until the end would have given it a bit more “wow” factor. Having said that totally enjoyed the video comparison.
One of the most difficult questions! What is the best 18yo? I need to set up an 18yo blind tasting. It would be so difficult! Out of these ones you have here I would say, 1-GlenDronach 18, 2- Bunnahabhain 18 and 3- Talisker 18. Fantastic trio! Others to consider, how about AnCnoc 18, GlenAllachie 18 and Bowmore 18? All very different but worthy of another layer of choices to your selection.
Awesome video Jeremy. Surprised you struggled to pick the Bunna out. That stuff really stands out to me. Unfortunately I just don’t get on with Talisker. It has kind of a rubbery/gasoline note that I just can’t get on with. We do have talisker 25 and 30 year old at our next tasting so we’ll see how they go 😃
Sweet vid but I feel like Aberlour 18 coulda made the cut and even Glenmo 18! But there are so many great 18’s out there even a blend like Chivas is a great value.
I have been lucky enought to get the glendronach 18 and the Talisker 18. Both really, really good and impressive. The oily texture and orange taste of the glen is one of kind... The Talisker is perfectly balanced Between the Sherry, frutiness and iodin influence. I was actually very suprise how good it was since i am cleary not a Talisker fan boy. I must try the Laphroaig... But it is so hard top find a bottle unfortunatly !
The problem with general population polls, it’s that some bottle are hard to find, making them outliers in the results since not a lot of people har the chance to try it such as Springbank 18.
That's quite the interesting test. Most of the time I'd pick something not peated but when I do it's always the most interesting and exciting. Kind of a woah I forgot how good that smells moment.
Great vid. Love your reviews. For me, Highland Park whiskeys are my favorite, but I have to admit I haven’t tried much out here in ex-commie land 😂 (one of the Eastern European countries) as they don’t have great selections where whiskey is concerned. I get lucky now and then to find a decent whisky
Great video. Modifier for next time...select your wild card after all the rounds and do not open the envelopes till the end of round 1... We can see the ones you are sipping on so no loss for us and keeps personal basis away till selections are made.
Really enjoyed this one. Lots of bottles I don't have access to purchase, however will be trying many at my favorite whiskey bar here in Minneapolis, Merlin's Rest. They have everything, which I is killing me with Covid. No tasting source currently.
Nice finalists of having the Laphroaig and Springbanks... nice whiskys but I reckon their younger bottlings are bolder expressions of the distillery... Springbank 10 and Laphroaig 10 are whiskys that i enjoy more than their 18yo
Great video series, you should do this with 12,13,15 and so on. Only thing I would potentially add is a score for each bottle in the description. I think another important factor in the equation here is the price, some cost way above 100 Eur (macallan) while others like the Arran 18 are only around 76 Eur, where I'm from at least. It's a good idea and although I believe the main point here was the quality not the price, I would do a price comparison list. Just my 2cents :D
Yes, value changes everything. Although can't really do value in a blind. But you could rank value before blind tasting then compare afterwards. I'll definitely so something similar again, cheers!
Great fun blind comparison Jeremy! Sounds like you have open bottles for long periods of time. Are you and Rob gassing your whiskies or just letting them oxidise over time and accept the different flavor profiles ?............Slainte!
I've tried Jura 10 and Springbank 10, which contain somewhat of a peaty taste. How does one make the leap to the phenolic Ardbeg and Laphroaig, which are so much stronger in the phenolic quality?
Agreed. I thought this was a big flaw because, even if you don't think you are, you may be playing favourites in the last bracket when you know what the 3 remaining bottles are. Also, leave the wild card until you've picked your winners, still unrevealed, until the end, as well.
Great drams all . I think you could separate 2 sets and give 2 gold medals . 1- Peated 2- Unpeated should be , you can't taste at the same time tough. Thank you , great tasting
I went to Osaka Japan during Chinese New Year selections of Scotch whisky was limited difficult to find and doubled in price when in 2022 was plentiful very disappointing
That was pretty epic. So many bottles on my to do list. Must confess I have avoided Macallan (I get an elitist vibe from them) and wanted it to bomb in this company so my uninformed opinion could be vindicated it really should be among the front runners in this bracket given the price. Pleased Springbank and Bunna performed so well and made up for the Longrow dropping out early. Only ones missing that I would have liked to see included would be Caol Ila, Ledaig, Balblair and maybe Deanston but all in all a really really great video. Waiting for the 18 year old dumpster fires video starring Dalmore, Jura, Auchentoshan and the mighty Speyburn
Should walker be in this being blended? I believe the rest are single malt. Not a fan of blended if you can't get it right with one!! Have had a couple of these and for me they were good. The price on some of these I can't justify that for whisky. I like daily drinkers over special occasions. If course of gifted well that's a horse of a different color unfortunately that doesn't happen often.
Title of the video is simply best 18 year old Scotch and all the bottles qualify under that heading. These were the Scotchs I had or could acquire for the video. Obviously the JW had no chance against the other powerhouses in the lineup haha
Tough category. Lots of fine entries. IMHO, Highland Park used to be the standard by which all others had to beat in the 18 year olds. These days I tend to gravitate to the Laphroaig 18 or the Springbank 18
This was fun to watch. Laphroaig always does well for me head to head. The finish just dominates! Question, would you pay $170usd for Glendronach 18, 2019(24yr)?
You should try to group the brackets by flavor profile, combining sherries in one bracket and peat on the other, the rest and can be mixed. I think that’ll be more interesting approach
Yes, that's true. Easier to pickout a peated scotch vs non-peated. I could have done a best 18yr sherry, or best 18 year peated, but I these were the bottles I had/had access to.
It would have been better to have opened the envelopes at the end to keep it truly blind and maybe a wild card from each group to compete against each other to reach the final. I think, also, that you could have done a separate tasting of peated 18's, as they tend to really stand out compared to the rest. Plenty out there to compare.
This is a surprise winner for me particularly as I don’t see u as the worlds biggest peat fan. It must be mentioned that Ralphy does not like the laphaiog 18. Ofcourse he cud be reviewing a different year, bottling. He thought the sweetness was artifical.
I'm a very big fan of peated scotch. Maybe you haven't seen many of my reviews, and Ralfy is one opinion, did he review the green tin as I did? Other versions are different.
